Until Everything is Normal
by Imagination-Parade
Summary: Moments from Claire & Owen's first week after the events of Jurassic World, including Karen's official introduction to Owen, sharing a hotel suite with the Mitchell crew, Claire's first press conference, Owen's first interview, Claire & Owen's official second date, and much more. Three-part sequel to "The First 48."
1. Chapter 1

_This is a sequel to my first Claire/Owen story called "The First 48." I would recommend reading that one first, but you maybe wouldn't have to. This one's going to be a 3-parter. As always, nothing's mine, and I hope you enjoy!_

* * *

There's a rhythmic scratching filling the room, one rapidly increasing in tempo. She absent-mindedly picks at the dinosaur on her shorts until breakfast arrives. It takes a little poking and prodding to get the glower off her face and her supposed diet out the window when the gluttonous French toast is unveiled (that's what she gets for leaving the ordering up to him, he argues,) but the fork eventually finds her fingers, and her hands stay busy as she eats.

She finishes her meal quickly, but he's still working on his and her hands become unoccupied again, an increasingly dangerous thing as her eyes focus with raptor-like intensity on the little blue screen print in the corner of her white shorts again.

 _Scratch. Scratch. Scratch. Scratch._

She needs to prepare herself. She'll probably be thrown in front of a press conference before the clock strikes noon tomorrow, so she has to find a balance, a balance between sympathetic manager and corporate bitch, as Owen would say. She has to figure out how to mentally distance herself from the park and the dinosaurs (have the attitude towards _the assets_ that she had just a few short days ago; she can't imagine going back to that way of thinking) and every decision that led to every disaster if she wants to survive this publicly, personally, and professionally, and she can't determine how to walk back into work tomorrow, exuding confidence with her head held high, if she's covered in fucking dinosaurs today.

She was relatively alright until she had taken the call about returning to work the night before, and he knows that's her trigger. His eyes fill with worry as he looks at her, her brow furrowed, her finger running a race against her thigh. It's not the strangest manifestation of post-traumatic stress he's ever seen, but it's up there, and he knows she's not going to get very far. She's the one who decides which vendors to use for the merchandise, after all, and he knows she would've chosen the best her budget could buy, and with a business that was raking in the cash like Jurassic World was just a few days ago, and maybe still is, if the online sales reports in her email are any indication, that's a pretty big merchandising budget.

He sighs and gathers the empty plates and the used cutlery, reluctantly leaving their shared chair, ready to place it all just outside the door for someone to collect. He nearly drops everything right onto his bare feet when the irritating scratching is replaced with her pained cry.

She's sucked her finger into her mouth, and he knows she's lost her battle. When she slips the digit back out of her lips, her nail is at an angle he hopes he never sees again, and her front teeth are stained with the faintest hint of her crimson red blood. She's pressed too hard, fought too fast, and the blue dinosaur on her thigh has come up the victor, just as he knew it would. She heads for the bathroom, insisting she's fine. He knows she's not fine.

When she returns, the blood is gone, her finger is wrapped in a bandage, but her eyes are red, and he's sitting on the edge of the bed facing the bathroom, waiting for her. She walks up to him without a word, and he brings his hands to her waist in what he hopes is a comforting, steadying grip, the t-shirt that she so intensely hates soft under his fingertips.

"Sleep, Claire," he says. "I'll lay down with you; you have to sleep."

"I can't," she mutters. She's tired; she barely slept the night before, but the little red numbers on the digital clock beside the bed insist on continuing to silently, metaphorically tick the day away, and the clock inside her head noting the time left before she has to step onto Masrani Global's plane not-so-silently ticks right along with it, and as long as the clocks are ticking, her mind is reeling, and she can't – she _can't_.

"So you're gonna take it out on the little dinosaur?" he gently teases, thumbing the print.

She covers her face with her hands again and says she knows she should enjoy this. She's in her last few precious quiet hours before her life becomes nothing but press conferences and lawsuits and damage control and telling people who _deserve_ compensation that the clauses they agreed to but almost certainly didn't read when purchasing tickets seriously limit Masrani Corp's liability and answering questions about a genetic hybrid she thought she knew about but had _no fucking clue_ about, but…but…

The hands against her waist begin gentle, soothing movements against her body, and she knows she doesn't have to say anything further. They may not know each other all that well, but he knows her well enough to know her mental itinerary for the day is booked solid.

He has seven hours and forty-two minutes until they have to leave that hotel room, and if he can't get her to sleep, he'll have to employ an alternate tactic for keeping her mind off the impending tomorrow.

He moves her shirt with his hands as they travel up her sides, exposing her pale stomach. She's got a nasty sunburn mirroring the scoop neck of the purple tank top she wore on _that day_ (it, along with all their other clothes, still lies in a dirty heap on the bathroom floor,) but her stomach is untouched by the harsh Central American sun, and he presses his lips to it in a kiss that _almost_ makes her giggle. One hand holds the tee against her waist while the other slides down her ass, gripping the hem underneath the dinosaur print on her shorts. He pulls gently, _slowly_ tugging the side of her shorts down, and he thanks god they defined their relationship as more than just for survival, or else he knows he'd never have the balls to do this. Even still, his name escapes her lips in an almost accusatory tone. He halts but claims, lips still pressed to her belly, that he knows her clothes are stressing her out.

"How can I forget about what I have to walk into tomorrow when I'm covered in it?" she asks.

"You can't," he agrees. "Guess the only thing to do is take them off." He finally meets her eyes, raising an eyebrow at her, and she tips her head to the side.

"It's the middle of the day," she says.

"Do you have something better to do?" he chuckles.

"No, but…" she starts. _Yes_ , she thinks. There are a thousand things and a thousand problems she could be should be working on right now, but the idea of leaving all that for Future Claire to deal with is an enticing one.

"Come _on_ , when's the last time the great Claire Dearing spent the day in bed?" he teases.

She laughs and looks away, trying to recall. "Not since…well, I don't think I've ever done that."

Without another word, he pulls her down into his lap, a leg on either side of his, the waistband of her shorts at a sharp angle against her hips, and meets her mouth in a searing, mind-erasing kiss.

* * *

Getting out of the hotel is hard. A car pulls up to the front double-doors – _damn this hotel for not having a viable back exit_ – and a security guard helps Owen and Claire get outside. The reporters and photographers haven't gone away; if anyway, the crowd has grown larger, the two days of radio silence and hibernation from the world's new favorite heroes having done nothing but feed the frenzy.

The kids, of course, don't care about the cameras, and as soon as they're in sight of the car, the boys spill out the back before Karen can stop them. Gray barrels into Claire, not unlike he had done inside of the Innovation Center, and the cameras go crazy. Zach stands close to Owen, too proud to do to him what Gray had done to their aunt (he's _sixteen_ ; he has a reputation to uphold, and he's not about to blow the wonders this week has done for him over a _hug_ , no matter how much he wants it) and Owen gets it, patting his shoulder a few times with a knowing grin.

Karen climbs out of the car as Claire manages to pry her nephew away from her, and the foursome in the middle of the entranceway make their way through the crowd. Gray gravitates towards his mother, and Claire instantly gravitates towards Owen. He voicelessly asks if she's alright, and she nods; she knows, in this moment, she's okay; the morning's stress hasn't found her again yet, but they're not _on the plane_ yet. Zach takes one look at their relaxed, almost- _too_ -happy glances at one another and laughs. Karen asks what's so funny.

"They look like sex," Zach laughs, and Claire hopes with everything she has in her that the scene outside the hotel isn't quiet enough for any of those cameras to pick up decent audio.

"And how would you know what that looks like, young man?" Karen asks. "Huh?"

"Don't worry, Mom," Gray pipes up. "He just _looks_ at girls. He doesn't know how to actually talk to one."

Karen and Claire try not to laugh too hard at the boy's expense as Zach shoves his little brother, _hard_ , muttering "Asshole," under his breath.

" _Hey_ , in the car. Both of you," Karen says sternly, grabbing Zach's hood and pulling him away from Gray. Claire takes a calming breath; _that_ was a _wonderful_ thing for the cameras to see, but it's not going to bother her. It's not. It's _not_. When both boys are back in the car, Karen turns to her sister and puts on a false, blissful smile. "That was such a nice two whole days of kindness and no fighting."

It's then that Karen notices their clothes and the fact that they don't have any bags in their arms. Claire is decidedly nondescript. She found black yoga pants in the pile of gifted clothes; _JURASSIC WORLD_ is stamped in hot, neon pink across the ass, something she found much more offensive than a small dinosaur print the day before, but she rolled down the waistband and grabbed a tank top long enough to cover the rest and flipped it inside out, anticipating cameras. She convinced Owen to do the same with his tee, but the orange and yellow board shorts slung low across his hips are covered in an island-themed dinosaur print she couldn't do anything about. Owen wears flip flops; Claire painfully pushed her feet back into her heels. Karen says they should've called her; she would've forced her way out of their room to buy them something; the reporters don't really want her anyway; it's the least she could do.

"Oh, that's okay," Owen says, playfully nudging Claire's side. He gestures to the shorts with his other hand and says, "She _loves_ me in these, don't you, babe?"

Claire shoots him a look that would stop a velociraptor in its tracks, and Karen gasps. "Wait – wait," she says, looking at Claire and pointing towards Owen. She looks a little too gleeful, and Claire knows what's coming, and she knows Karen's thinking this is just a little too good to be true. " _This_ is _Board Shorts_?" Karen asks.

Owen's face falls as Claire tries and _miserably_ fails not to laugh as she nods with a look on her face that says she can't quite believe it herself. She keeps her eyes on her sister as Owen glares at her in disbelief. She can feel his thoughts without any words – _You told your sister about that date? How could you tell your sister about that date? Now I'll always be_ Board Shorts _and_ not _the guy who helped save her kids from dinosaurs_ – so she puts an arm around him and pats his back, and his face melts into a grin as Karen continues to giggle across from them.

Claire suddenly gets swept away in a thought that without the cameras surrounding them, this – Owen and her family, Owen as her _boyfriend_ with her family – would almost feel normal, but she's acutely aware of the cameras focused on her ( _oh god_ , she hopes they're not actually hearing any of this) and the dinosaur logo hidden between her breasts, and her stomach fills with anxiety as she remembers nothing about this is normal.

She sees Karen catch a glimpse of them out of the corner of her eye, and she sees Karen's face contort into a grimace as the older woman lowers her voice and disgustedly informs the sickening couple that they do, indeed, look like sex. Claire pulls herself back to the moment and does nothing but briefly tilt her head towards Owen, the good kind of guilt written all over her face, and she and Owen share a knowing smile. Karen rolls her eyes.

"Yeah, uh-huh, I've spent the past two days stuck in one room with a husband I can't stand and two traumatized children, and _you've_ spent the past two days having _sex_ ," Karen sneers. Claire gently grabs Owen's wrist and checks his watch (hers has been a casualty of the _incident_ ) and informs her that it's really only been on and off for the past seven hours or so, not two whole days, and oh god, _why_ are they still talking _outside_ of the car? Karen nods and says, "Still. Life is _super_ fair."

* * *

The boys think the private plane is _awesome_ ; Claire's torn between wanting the nearly six hour flight to San Diego to be over and hoping that it never ends. **  
**

She slips her heels off as soon as she gets settled in her seat. She's sitting next to Owen and across from Karen, the set of four seats facing each other, with the boys on a couch on the other side of the plane. The door to the plane is sealed shut, and Claire asks where Scott is.

"On the way home," Karen says, completely not caring that her children are present when she adds, "Bastard." Off her sister's look, she continues, "Apparently seeing on the news that genetically modified dinosaurs have run amuck on an island containing _three_ family members and _both_ children is not an acceptable reason to take off from work with no notice."

Owen notices Claire attempting to stretch her feet against the floor of the plane – anything, _anything_ to make the pain still radiating in them go away – and he scoops them up, swiveling her in her seat and placing them in his lap.

"Let me take care of you," he mutters in a low, raspy voice as she tries to protest and pull her feet away. He says it exactly the same way he said it against her inner thigh, just before his tongue touched her for the first time, and damn it if that doesn't stop her in her tracks, a small, hopefully indiscernible moan escaping her lips.

He soothingly works his fingers against her feet, carefully avoiding the blisters that are still tender, and maybe it's leftover peace from the orgasms, or maybe it's the realization that everybody on the plane loves her (or at least likes her enough to want to survive with her), but she sinks down sideways into her seat, more of her long legs spilling into his lap. She can let herself be a little vulnerable, she thinks. It's a Masrani Global Corporation plane, and she's had business meetings on this very plane before, but she doesn't need to be Claire Dearing, Operations Manager, right now; she doesn't need to be _on_ right now.

That thought inevitably trails her mind back to work, and she reaches for her phone. There are new messages, _good lord, are there new messages_ ; they have yet to really slow down since _the incident_ , but none of them are the messages she was hoping for, so she rests her phone against her chest with a small, perturbed sigh.

"What's wrong?" Owen asks.

She shakes her head as if to say it's nothing. She's not going to do it. She can already feel the stress permeating her being again, and she's not going to do it. She's not going to think about work until she has to…but she continues.

"It's Zara. She hasn't answered any of my messages," Claire says, and across from them, the boys simultaneously let out a barely audible gasp, freezing when they realize they've caught Karen's attention. "It's on the Masrani website that she's my assistant, though, so she's probably getting bombarded, too. I thought she'd be on this plane. Maybe she's already back at headquarters."

"Um…" Zach says, discomfort burning off of every cell that makes up his being. "They didn't…they didn't tell you?"

"Tell me what?" Claire asks normally, certainly not expecting the storm that's about to hit her.

"Aunt Claire," Zach says softly, desperately not wanting to be the person who has to tell her this. "Zara's…she's…"

Words fail him, so Gray steps in, muttering, with a soft voice, "She's dead."

Claire shoots up in her seat, tearing her feet from Owen's lap, her hands immediately traveling to her mouth as tears fill her eyes. "Oh god," she gasps. "No…no, she's getting married; she can't be…what happened?"

"We met up with her again on Main Street," Zach says slowly, looking anywhere but at his mother or Claire. "She got picked up by a pteranodon, and she was fighting, so I thought she might be okay…hurt but okay…but then it…well, then it dropped her in the mosasau…"

Nobody hears him finish, and nobody hears the curse that escapes Owen's stunned lips, because Claire lets out the worst noise of shock and terror he's ever heard someone make and buries her face all the way into her hands as she turns her body away from them and into the side of the plane. Owen flips the arm rest separating their seats up as soon as he sees her start to shake; she's breaking, quietly but utterly _breaking_ against the wall of the plane.

She knows the Indominus is not her fault, despite the guilt she knows she'll probably always feel, but this, Zara, oh god, _this_ is _completely_ her fault, and explaining to Zara's nice fiancé that she died chasing after nephews that Claire couldn't be bothered to shuffle some meetings around for is suddenly at the top of her Things to Be Stressed About list.

That's all it takes for the impending internal interrogations and her active entry into the already hyper-active media circus to take up prominence in her brain again, and it's a fight she's still not ready for; the only thing she's ready for is going back to bed with Owen in Costa Rica, where nothing mattered except lips and skin and _oh yes, right there_ as they made love in the afternoon sunlight (that's really the only thing you could call it the way they had done it: slow, tender, the-only-thing-I-want-to-discover-right-now-is-you lovemaking.)

That's why, when she feels his large hand on her trembling back, she turns and lets him gather her into his arms, climbing onto his lap so she's straddling him again. One of his arms comes around her body to rest low, probably too low with her family around, on her back, the other cradling the back of her head. Karen wordlessly gets up and puts herself between her sons.

"You guys saw that?" she asks quietly. "You watched the whole thing?"

Gray looks up at her with a tear-stained face, silently nodding. Zach tells her she's seen it, too. It was in one of the internet videos; it was shot from so far away, you couldn't tell who it was, but he knew…he knew. Even Zach's eyes are watery, so Karen wraps an arm around each boy.

Owen's trying, rocking Claire gently and quietly shushing her, even though she's hardly making any noise at all, whispering that she's okay; it's okay because he knows she's upset about more than just Zara. She shakes her head furiously against his shoulder and cries, "You can't tell me this one's not my fault, Owen. I _made her go out there_. She should've been safe in an office, but I made her…I made her…"

She surrenders, sobbing so painfully he's not even sure she's breathing, and he doesn't say anything because she's right. He can't tell her not to feel guilty this time.

* * *

The first time she wakes up screaming, it's all his fault.

There are jungle noises in her head, noises accompanied by stomping feet, shaking ground, ear-shattering roars, more teeth. Her eyes shoot open in the dark, and she realizes she's wrong. There aren't jungle noises in her head. There are jungle noises in her _room_.

Somewhere between the subconscious illusion of Isla Nublar and the reality of the cool San Diego hotel room, Owen's moved over to her and he's stroking her back, whispering soothing words, telling her she's okay as she sits on the mattress. She knows he thinks that she's having a panic attack about going back to work in – she checks a clock – _oh, god, only five more hours_ , but it's not the impending conferences this time.

A boy screams from the suite's second bedroom, and her sister calls over, " _Thanks a lot, Claire_!"

She cringes, and she thinks she would feel culpable if she weren't about to be _so mad_ at Owen. "What the hell is that?" she hisses, whipping around at the waist to glare at him. "Is that coming from _the clock_?"

He doesn't know what she's talking about. She demands to know why their room suddenly sounds like a Central American island. Guilt immediately colors his face.

He couldn't sleep. He thought she was out, so he'd turned on the ambient noise feature on the swanky hotel's provided clock. He'd set it to the rainforest setting: it sounded the most normal, the most like what he knew as home, where he could sometimes hear dinosaurs roar in the distance at all hours of the night.

He turns it off immediately, apologizing profusely, encouraging her to lie down again.

She thinks she should break up with him right then and there. Instead, she sinks in to his embrace, trying not to focus on the struggle they can still hear from the other room.


	2. Chapter 2

She taps the toes of her new high heels against the linoleum floor, nerves unable to stay in her belly. She's already on edge, being _here_ in Masrani Global headquarters has made her jittery, and Owen's not helping. In fact, she can barely look at him right now.

She'd gotten up early and hit a store with Karen. They were _all_ in need of new clothes, the boys' luggage left behind on Isla Nublar and Karen having not packed for more than about a day, and Claire downright refused to walk into that office looking anything other than polished and professional, and she had wanted Owen to do the same. Owen, also in an edgy mood upon the moment of waking, declared _fuck it_ , he was going in the dinosaur board shorts, and if Masrani had a problem, they could just _deal_ _with it_ because it's their damn fault anyway. His expletive-filled declaration had led to Zach deciding to go in the hoodie purchased from the Costa Rican hotel, and Karen had decided that was a battle not worth fighting. Gray put on a tie in a sweet attempt to make her feel better.

Sitting on the couch in the Masrani lounge, she thinks, they look a lot like they did on their ill-fated date: her, in a sleek cobalt blue dress and black high heels (and black hosiery and a sweater to cover all the cuts and bruises), her hair in an elegant up-do, and him in board shorts, flip flops, and a graphic tee, hair a rumpled mess on his head. It was irritating then, and it's _infuriating_ now, and Karen and the boys, who inexplicably came up _first_ on Masrani's interview docket, have been in there _way_ too long.

When they finally emerge, Gray looks terrified all over again, Zach looks uncomfortable, and Karen is downright _sobbing_ ; she's presumably just heard the whole story of what her children experienced for the first time, and Claire realizes she doesn't even know for sure what happened to them before she spotted them on Main Street. She can guess, judging from the state in which they found their gyrosphere, but as she and Owen stand, she thinks she won't ask them to recount it again; she can read it in a report later, and all trains of thought leave her body as Karen hugs her harder than she ever has as an adult.

"Thank you," Karen cries, repeating the words at least three times. "Oh my god, Claire, you're my hero."

A smile appears on her face for the first time that day as she holds Karen with one arm and reaches for Gray with the other. Gray takes her hand, Zach sinks onto the couch, and Owen follows the Masrani representatives down the hallway for his turn.

He thinks the meeting will be a simple recounting of events and experiences, which he's planned to fill with snide remarks, a little too eager to them _exactly_ what he thinks of bigger, scarier, _more teeth_. And that's what the meeting is, at first. It rapidly dissolves into questions about his relationship, his feelings towards Claire Dearing, both personally and professionally. They ask his opinions of her competency, the decisions she made that day, her ability to lead and manage a multi-billion dollar theme park like Jurassic World. His face hardens and he asks what's really going on here.

"We would appreciate an answer to the questions, Mr. Grady," a man replies.

"Not until you tell me what this really is," he sternly answers.

Owen returns to the lounge, the Masrani reps behind him, looking rather enraged. All heads in the room turn to look at him as he enters, and concern immediately colors Claire's face.

"Ms. Dearing," the man calls in an emotionless voice.

With a deep breath and a slight nod of her head, Claire stands and straightens her dress. As she walks by, Owen grabs her arm, breaking what little confidence she had managed to muster.

"I'm here," he says. He wants to kiss her, but he knows she won't appreciate that in the middle of her bosses' offices, so verbal reassurance will have to do. "I'm not going anywhere. I'm going to be right here when you're done."

"Okay," Claire replies slowly, concern turning to confusion as she's not really sure where else he would be, the pit of dread in her stomach growing.

She disappears down the hallway with the Masrani team, and Owen sinks onto the couch next to Zach, opposite Gray and Karen. He meets Karen's eyes; she looks as worried as he feels. He holds her gaze for a few seconds before letting out a deep breath and dragging his hand across his mouth and chin as he mutters, "Shit."

Claire's not sure what she expected when she walked into the conference room, but she doesn't think it was this. They don't seem very interested in her encounters with the dinosaurs or what happened to them in the jungle, and she struggles to answer their questions. What stands out in her mind from the day that simultaneously feels like yesterday and years ago is how she felt when it looked like her boys had been ripped and devoured from a crushed gyrosphere and the Indominus making a garage rain on her and Owen and _open Paddock 9_ and oh god, _more teeth_.

She barely remembers when, why, and how she chose to close everything north of the resorts. She doesn't know why Owen and the Indominus guards chose to go into the paddock after she left for the control room. The decisions made before she took off to find her nephews (and they even want to know why she thought it was okay to do _that_ in a crisis and _are they serious_? There are exactly two things from that day she's not going to apologize for, and that's one of them,) are a hazy blur, but they want to know what decisions were made and when and why and which of her calls were hers and which ones were simply her supporting Mr. Masrani's choices, and she doesn't know; she doesn't _remember_.

She can feel frustrated tears fighting to make an appearance, and she _will not_ cry in this boardroom, so she, just as Owen had done before her, asks what's really going on.

"This is an investigation, Ms. Dearing," the man tells her.

She nods her head as if to say she knows that. She's not an idiot; she knew there would be an investigation into what and where they went so horribly wrong, but the questions they're asking are primarily about decisions that were made _after_ things went wrong, _not_ before, and suddenly…it clicks.

"Wait, an investigation into _me_?" she asks. She should've expected that, too, she thinks, but from what she's seen from the media, this company is, so far, all too happy to play her up as nothing but an absolute hero, the goddamn _savior_ of Jurassic World, so she's a little surprised.

"You're the Senior Operations Manager, Ms. Dearing," the man replies. "We know Mr. Masrani was on the ground that day, and we will take that into account, but we still need to determine what your future with Jurassic World and Masrani Global is going to be."

* * *

She's not on television by noon, but she is to be on television at three. She's a little surprised they're throwing her into a press conference in light of the investigation, but she's the one people want to see. Despite the vocal minority online calling for her firing or resignation, most people seem to be on her side, and a still from the T-Rex footage is still making the rounds – the _TIME_ magazine cover comes out soon, she's told – so she's been appointed the public face of Masrani Global as far as this incident is concerned.

The conference is to be held just outside of Masrani headquarters, making it unfortunately accessible to _anyone_ who wants to just stand around and watch (which, by the looks of it, is at least half of San Diego.) The cameras and the people are already there. Karen and the kids have gone back to the hotel, but Owen's still around, watching with concern as she paces back and forth in the main lobby, methodically rehearsing her lines.

"I am Claire Dearing, Senior Operations Manager of Jurassic World…that's stupid; they already know that. They've all seen me play bait to a T-Rex…okay, Claire, focus…" She takes a breath and tries again. "I am Claire Dearing, Senior Operations Manager of Jurassic World. Everyone at Jurassic World and Masrani Global deeply regrets the incident at the park and the pain and suffering experienced by our loyal guests, employees, and their families. We are working hard to determine what went wrong…or was it we are diligently working to determine…or ascertain…or…I am Claire Dearing…"

"Okay," Owen says, grabbing her arms gently, halting her in the middle of the lobby. He can't watch this self-inflicted mental torture anymore, but he doesn't quite know how to help because they'd both still rather curl up in a ball and wait for the Indominus to eat them than speak to reporters. "You can do this, babe."

He knows that was the wrong thing to say as her face steels, and the manager he knew at the park returns. "I _know_ that; I just don't _want_ to do it, and I'm not used to my job being things I don't _want_ to do. Do not question my professional competency, Grady."

With that, she opens the doors, cameras flashing wildly as she steps outside with a PR rep from the company behind her. He watches breaking live news coverage from a TV hung in the lobby. She hits all her given talking points perfectly, but once she's done and the questions start flooding in, it becomes clear how wholly unprepared she is.

The reporters have information that she doesn't, including the current death toll (dozens, a lot of employees, at least 3 of whom weren't even on the clock but just playing in the park on their day off), the number of guests still in critical condition in Costa Rican hospitals (way too many), and the number of reported injuries ( _hundreds_ , near _thousands_.) They also know the genetic makeup of the Indominus Rex, and she definitely doesn't, beyond the base genome and Owen's speculation about it being part-raptor, and she only remembers _that_ because hearing that sentence come through her tablet's speakers while he was out there mere feet from the dinosaurs nearly made her heart stop beating. Someone asks her a question about the genetic makeup of the animal, and she stutters, having no idea how they even _obtained_ the information that was so classified, it had never even been shared with her.

The investigation, it seems, has put her on a need-to-know basis, and someone decided she didn't need to know, and while the media has been mostly kind to her, there are those out there who want her head on a platter, and she's suddenly overcome with anger; she's _so mad_ at the corporation for making her look like this in her first official appearance that a little part of her hopes she's damaging more than just her own personal reputation.

When everyone begins to get that she no longer really knows what she's talking about, the questions turn into personal attacks, not from the reporters, but from passersby.

"How does it feel knowing you're personally responsible for all those injuries and deaths?" someone in the crowd yells.

A reporter runs with that spectator's idea, asking how Claire intends to make that right, and Claire backs slightly away from the mic, at a loss as to what to say as she mentally questions how at fault she is all over again. Someone else in the crowd yells that Claire as good as killed all those people herself, and Owen, still watching from just inside the door, thinks that if the PR rep behind her hadn't shut down the conference at that point, he would've.

She's ushered back inside by the PR rep and a Masrani security guard, and, wordlessly, without stopping, she grabs Owen's arm, and nearly drags him to the nearest unoccupied, windowless storage closet she can find. Owen finds a string and flicks on a dim light.

"I'm sorry," she breathes, her eyes brimming with tears. "I'm sorry for snapping at you before the press conference. I just…"

"Shh…shhh," Owen says, pulling her into the kiss he's been waiting all day to give her. He cups her face in his palm as their lips meet over and over in soft, gentle pecks, and he feels the tears spilling down her cheeks.

The crying becomes too much to continue the kisses, so he wraps his arms around her and holds her right there in the storage closet until she stops.

* * *

He finds himself unexpectedly on television just a few hours later. InGen had called, once, to ascertain his whereabouts after the incident, but they hadn't so much as asked for a report yet, and he knows the chances of an investigation into him are slim, so he's surprised when someone calls and asks him (no, _tells_ him) to report to a specific hotel at a specific time. The meeting place is all the way across the city, and Claire can't come with him; she's tied up at Masrani, so he reluctantly leaves and walks into the room of lights and cameras alone.

It's to be a live network interview, and he arrives barely an hour before it's set to begin. They hand him a suit and put stage makeup on his face, and as they sit him down next to an InGen representative he's never met before and announce five minutes to show with barely a prep beforehand, he realizes he's no more ready to deal with the media than Claire was.

He hates what InGen wanted for the raptors as much as he hates what Masrani ordered for the Indominus, and he doesn't have the PR savvy or the practice that Claire has (he doesn't think he's ever even _met_ a journalist before this week), and as the lights go on and the cameraman counts down, he knows he's in trouble. He feels as in the dark as Claire looked during her press conference. Fury is already coiled in his stomach, but when he discovers InGen's damage control strategy, he thinks he may explode.

Blame Claire. That's their strategy. Refuse all responsibility, and pin it all on Claire, and Owen knows it might work. The footage from the incident will certainly help her; it's indisputable, but vilifying a woman in power is one of America's favorite things to do, so he knows InGen, at the very least, could make her less of the celebrated hero she's been thus far and more of a polarizing figure. He tries to grit his teeth and bare it – talk her praises when he gets the rare chance to speak, subtly and not-so-subtly place blame elsewhere, but they're determined.

As things escalate, he knows what she'd say if she could speak to him right now. It'd be a lot of _It's okay, Owen_ , and _It comes with the job, Owen_ , and _I'll take care of it. Just get through this. You can do this_ ,but he can't. He can't do this, and the next thing he knows, his fist has firmly connected with the InGen representative's face.

"Claire Dearing is a goddamn _hero_ ," Owen yells as the man hits the ground.

"That means a lot, coming from her _boyfriend_ ," the man on the ground sarcastically coughs out.

"What do you have to say to that, Mr. Grady?" the startled reporter asks.

"I say that's a load of shit," he says. "That kiss you all are so gleefully circulating through the Internet was our first. It may have been poor timing, but she had just shocked the hell out of me and shot a dinosaur off my chest, so I'm gonna stand by that decision."

He goes on to tell them that Claire Dearing worked at a very different Jurassic World than he did, one filled with investors and spreadsheets and control rooms. Sure, he said, she'd seen the dinosaurs, but she had never really _seen_ the dinosaurs until she held the head of a dying Apatosaurus in the field. She didn't work with them like he did, and the way she handled herself in the jungle was nothing short of goddamn admirable.

"She risked her life to save her sister's children when they went missing on the island, and then she kept on doing it to stop a monster that she may have encouraged but did not create, and I will not sit here and let people with such dishonorable intentions for living, breathing, unpredictable animals blame someone else for their mistakes. We're done here."

In a hotel across the city, Zach laughs and mutters, " _Badass_!" as they watch Owen rip his microphone off and storm off the set. Karen, who's been tightly holding Claire's hand since the interview began, gives it a squeeze. She still thinks Claire and Owen are jumping into something serious _awfully_ fast, she says, but hey, whatever, she approves, and Claire feels a new kind of fear warm her body.

There's a loud banging on the suite door about an hour later. Gray's curled into Claire's side on the couch, so Zach gets up to let Owen in.

"The room InGen gave me sucks; I'm staying here," Owen announces as he enters.

Claire shifts Gray against Karen and makes her way over to Owen. "I didn't realize you were considering _not_ staying here."

"Did you see it?" he asks.

She nervously chuckles and says she thinks the whole world saw it. There's a moment of silence before she stands on her toes to kiss him softly, and Karen playfully covers Gray's eyes as their lips meet. When she drops back down to her bare feet, Owen says he thought she'd be mad. He's just added to the PR nightmare that is this entire mess, and he doesn't know how she feels about having a man defend her on national TV.

"I don't _need_ you to defend me, but it's nice that you did," she says. She grins wickedly and adds, "And you're InGen's problem, not mine. That whole 'different Jurassic World' thing was brilliant. I might steal that."

He grins and says he's glad she liked that, but he's never speaking to reporters again. She's relatively okay with that.

* * *

It's really been all about her so far, so when he comes to bed that night, she tells him she'll give him anything he needs. To her surprise, he grabs a pillow and shoves it under his head as he climbs onto the bed, laying his head on her lap, and she grins. She had expected him to have her shirt off in about four seconds flat, but she's secretly glad she gets to take care of him in this loving way instead. He's facing the TV, lying on his side, and begins lightly stroking her leg as she threads her fingers in his damp hair.

"Like this?" she asks, and he nods, grabbing for the remote.

He turns the news on as she caresses the side of his body, and their faces are all over the screen. She says they don't have to watch this.

"But you need to," he mutters.

"I _should_ ; I don't _have_ to," she says, and he leaves it on.

The newscaster introduces the segment on Jurassic World by playing some of the leaked footage from late at night on Main Street. When the footage stops, she identifies Claire and Owen with their titles, then says the children with them have been identified as Claire's nephews, 16-year-old Zach Mitchell and 11-year-old Gray Mitchell.

Claire lightly hits Owen's arm and says, "Sixteen and eleven! I knew that."

Owen chuckles (she definitely didn't know that) and kisses her thigh, the nearest bare skin he can reach from his comfortable residence on her lap. They flip between multiple news channels, watching reports on themselves and the incident until well after midnight, and they're both a little mortified. Everyone's _loving_ the clip of Owen punching the InGen representative, his sound bites regarding her are everywhere, and she thinks she's now watched the disastrous end to her press conference more times than she's replayed it in her head. The day's appearances didn't do anyone any favors.

There's a knock at their door just after one in the morning. They're staying in a two-room suite, a small living room and kitchen area in between the two bedrooms. Claire looks down at Owen, who's still in her lap, and he nods. She calls for their visitor to come in, expecting Karen.

"Aunt Claire?" a male voice asks as Zach slowly opens the door. Her eyes widen; he's crying, and she gently but swiftly slips out from underneath Owen, adjusting her pajama shorts as she makes her way towards him.

"Oh, sweetheart, what happened?" she asks, instantly wrapping him into a hug. He's taller than she is, so it's a little awkward, but he sinks in to her comforting embrace, burying his head into her shoulder.

"It's my fault," he says after a few moments, pulling back from the hug.

"No," Claire replies softly. "No, Zach, why would you say that?"

"Not the dinosaur or the fact that it got out, but everything that happened to _us_ is my fault because I didn't bring the gyrosphere back," he says. "It said go back, but I didn't, so Gray and I got attacked, and you and Owen almost got killed trying to find us, and Zara's dead, and Gray can't sleep, and Mom cries all the time, and Owen's punching people on TV, and you're under investigation, and it's all my fault. Why didn't I just go back?"

They eventually end up on the floor, Zach still crying into Claire's shoulder, and this is _completely_ new territory for her, and she's not sure what to do, so she waves at Owen to get the dinosaurs off the television while she rubs his back and tells him it's okay, no one blames him; she'd be under investigation whether he had taken the gyrosphere into the woods or gone right back to the hotel, and Owen jumps in, assuring Zach that he would still be punching people, too. At that, she turns to glare at the man on her bed with the intention of berating him with her eyes, but instead, she thinks that if the devastated boy in her arms is to blame for anything, it's this; it's _them_ , because she never would've gone after him if she hadn't needed to find her nephews.

The door from the second bedroom across the suite opens, and Zach and Claire are just inside the cracked doorway to her room, so Karen has a clear view of them on the floor. She makes her way over, glancing at a clock, and bends down to grab her son.

"Hey, sweetie, come on…" Karen whispers, trying to take over.

"No," Zach mutters. "Mom, I love you, but I need Claire."

Karen looks at her sister again; Claire nods, silently telling her it's alright. Karen looks a bit hurt but says okay and tries to understand. She ruffles both of their hair, Zach's in comfort and Claire's in thanks before taking up residence at the end of Claire's bed. Owen leans over and grabs her shoulder in support.

* * *

 _Thanks, everyone, for reading! Please review if you have a moment :-)_


	3. Chapter 3

_This is the third and final installment of this story (and my personal favorite!) Enjoy!_

* * *

He trails kisses along every scrape, bruise, and sunburn line on her upper body, and she wonders how he just seems to know which spots hurt the most and which ones are okay to put more pressure on with his lips. It's getting late, _really_ late, and Claire Dearing has never once let a man make her late to work, but when she woke up to Owen spooned behind her, playing with one of her nipples and gently sucking on her neck, she surrendered. Her hands slide up and down his back as he moves above her, and it's fast again, but it's good, _so_ good.

The quiet knock at the door is almost masked by Owen's heavy breathing against her ear. She made it a point to lock the door before their clothes came off, but the walls are _so_ incredibly thin, and there are kids out in the sitting room, kids that have been traumatized enough for one vacation, so they know they have to be quiet. Her sister calls their names, telling them that breakfast is almost ready, and she made enough for them, too.

"Okay, we'll be right…" Claire's voice trails off on a faint moan.

She hasn't quite lost the ability to think, though with Owen's hand slowly slipping down her body, she knows it's only a matter of time, and she thinks she can almost literally _hear_ Karen's eyes rolling on the other side of the door, and it's not fair. She knows it's not fair. Karen's getting divorced, and Claire went from contently single to basically shacking up with a hot-as-hell raptor trainer who makes her feel like everything's going to be alright in just under 72 hours, and Karen's either witnessing it or incessantly hearing about it from two boys with a serious case of hero worship, and then Owen's fingers find their destination, and she arches into him, melting underneath his touch as she hears Karen, in a deadpan voice, say Aunt Claire's going to be a few more minutes.

The conversation about breakfast and pancakes on the other side of the door is drowned out in a flood of pleasure, but when she hears Gray anxiously ask if she's going to jail as they're in bed basking in warm, afterglow kisses, she knows it's time to get up.

"What? No! Honey, why would you think that?" she hears Karen reply as she tears herself away from Owen. The only word she catches out of Gray's reply is "investigation," and Karen sighs, telling him that's more about keeping her job, and she won't be seeing the inside of a courtroom any time soon. Claire knows that's probably not true. She won't be on trial, but despite the liability waivers on the Jurassic World tickets, someone, somehow, someway is ending up in a courtroom over this, but Gray doesn't know that, so he switches topics.

"So what about school?" he asks as Claire opens her bedroom door.

Karen freezes, mentally calculating what day it is (she's had absolutely no idea since she saw the breaking news about Jurassic World on the television set in her attorney's office; they even managed to somehow miss New Year's,) and a realization crosses her face. "Shit," she says, lunging for her phone.

Claire makes her way over to the counter, wrapped in a hotel robe. "What about school?" she asks. Gray tells her Christmas break ended yesterday as she pops Karen's forgotten blueberries into her mouth.

"What do you mean ' _what is the reason for their extended absence_?'" Karen nearly shrieks from the other room. "Have you turned on a TV lately? They were a sheet of Plexiglas away from being a dinosaur's lunch at my sister's theme park, and now Masrani Global is holding us hostage in San Diego until they decide my sister, who _barely_ passed biology, by the way, had nothing to do with building a genetic hybrid murder machine!"

"You barely passed biology?" Owen says with a laugh, joining the congregation in the kitchen.

"And, as always, your timing is impeccable, Grady," Claire replies sarcastically.

"I've listened to you rattle off information about genetic modification like it was nothing!"

"I can memorize as many talking points as you want, just don't ask me to do it," she says.

Owen laughs again. He thinks this might be the best thing he's learned about her yet. "Maybe we should get Masrani to give you a test on gene splicing and genetics. That should clear you."

That remark earns him another _that's-not-funny_ look from Claire, but he doesn't even care and keeps on chuckling as he walks to the fridge. Karen returns, frazzled, and abruptly stops in her tracks when she sees Owen, dressed in nothing but a pair of sweatpants, drop a kiss into her sister's hair as he makes his way back across the kitchen. Her eyes widen a little at the sight of his bare chest, and Claire, of course, notices, a small smirk forming on her face.

"You okay, sis?" she teases. Karen gives Owen another once-over and mumbles again about life just _really_ not being fair, and despite the bit of guilt she feels in her stomach, it's Claire's turn to laugh.

* * *

The familiar click of a hotel keycard sliding into the door alerts them that they're about to no longer be alone. They're on the couch watching the day's Jurassic World coverage (at this point, they don't think it's ever going to slow down), Owen's arm slung casually around her shoulders, and there's an alarming amount of banging and noises of struggle as the boys burst into the hotel suite, yelling her name, cries of "look what we got!" propelling her to her feet. Her nephews enter the living area, each of them holding a novelty check almost as big as Gray. At least that explains all the thumping.

"What is that?" Claire asks. As the question leaves her lips, her eyes zero in on the $10,000 figure written in bold black font on each check. "Oh my god!"

"Ellen gave them scholarships for their commendable quick-thinking and bravery in the face of the Indominus Rex," Karen says slowly as she enters the room at a speed equal to her speech. She's staring at the presumably real, normal-sized versions of the checks in her slightly shaking hands. Claire almost laughs – the mixture of utter shock and thrill on her face is a sight to be seen. Karen waves the checks to the side, looks at Claire, and adds, "I mean, I am a little annoyed, as a mom, that they're getting so handsomely rewarded for blatantly defying instructions with that hamster ball thingy, but _oh my god_."

Despite witnessing Claire and Owen's disastrous first public appearances, the boys hadn't wavered in their clamoring to do an interview. Karen had eventually relented and agreed, accepting the offer from _The Ellen DeGeneres Show_ , thinking that would be the friendliest place for them, and the trio had just returned from the taping in Burbank. Both boys spoke excitedly at once, trying to tell Claire all about their appearance. She didn't catch much, but they had, apparently, fulfilled their wish to tell the world about how they electrocuted a velociraptor from the back of a speeding vehicle, and she puts a hand on each boy's shoulder with a laugh, elated by how full of life they are, and promises to watch the show the next day.

Karen finally catches a glimpse at the television, sees that another person has died from their Jurassic World injuries, and quietly asks how their day was. Claire says any day she manages to get through without someone mentioning a return to the island – she'll go when it's time, but she's glad it's not time – is a good day. She drops her voice to match Karen's tone and says Owen's been fired.

"Hey," Owen says, finally standing to join the group. "I prefer the term 'officially released from my contract.' That just sounds better." Gray looks sad, and Zach immediately looks guilty, which Owen catches with rapid speed. "That's not your fault, either, dude. My raptors are gone; I don't really have anything to go back to."

It's the first time he's mentioned his girls since the island, and though he hasn't verbalized it, Claire knows he's hurting over their loss, so she slides her arm around his back and leans in to him. He wraps his arm around her, too.

"Plus, you know," Owen adds. "I punched one of the company higher-ups on live, national television, and I refuse to apologize for it, so I had it coming."

"I have good news for you, though," Claire says to Karen.

"Better news than the twenty _thousand_ dollars in my hands?" Karen asks skeptically.

"You get to go home," Claire reveals.

"What? Is it over? Is everything okay?" Karen asks. She grabs a lock of Claire's hair and lets it slip through her fingers as she adds, "Are _you_ okay?"

"That's still ongoing," Claire sighs. "But I convinced them there was no reason to keep kids out of school when they've already been thoroughly interviewed and have no experience with me as a manager."

"The kids weren't complaining, you know," Zach mutters.

"Hey," Karen snaps, putting the check with his name on it in front of his face. "You've got to get into college, buddy. Back to school for you."

Zach surprises everyone by tossing his novelty check down and wrapping Claire in a hug. Claire giggles and returns the hug, and it instantly becomes Owen's new life goal to make her make that noise again someday soon.

"Goodness, what is this for?" she asks, taken aback by the teenager's affection.

"Don't let me be out of college before I see you again," he mutters, pulling back, a little embarrassed.

"Oh, sweetheart," she says, clutching his cheeks. "You're going to see so much of me from now on, you'll get totally sick of me."

* * *

Morning comes far too soon, and the Mitchells are getting ready to leave, and both boys are clinging to Claire as if their lives still depended on it while Karen embraces Owen in a hug, asking him how she can ever thank him for putting himself in danger to take care of her family. Owen looks over at his happy, teary girlfriend, still sandwiched between her two nephews, and a fond smile crosses his face.

"Let her see them again," he says. "Maybe sometimes alone. She's scared you're never going to trust her with them again – but you didn't hear that from me."

Karen scoffs as if that's the most preposterous thing she's ever heard and says if anything, it's the opposite of that. She looks at Owen for a moment and quietly adds that even though she has her concerns about them, she's really glad her sister isn't alone in all this. He just grins his shared approval of the situation, and Karen declares a switch. The boys nearly pummel Owen to the couch, and she hugs her little sister, _hard_ , again.

"Seriously," Karen says, pulling back after several long seconds. "If Gray is graduating high school the next time we see you, I'm going to have someone send that T-Rex after you again."

That joke shouldn't be funny. Neither of them should find that funny this close to the _incident_ , but, despite themselves, they both laugh. Karen tells the boys it's time to go, but neither boy really wants to leave, so Karen hustles them towards the door, but not before Gray can steal one last hug from Aunt Claire. Karen picks her duffel bag off the floor and swings it around her shoulder.

"I'll call you when we get home," she promises Claire, who nods in response. She then turns to Owen and because she just can't resist, says, "Nice meeting you, Board Shorts."

Claire laughs; no, she downright _cackles_ as Owen glares at Claire from across the room and mutters, "I hate you."

"That's not what you said last night," she teases, eagerly throwing his joke from the island back in his face.

"Hey, I thought you were worried about us being late!" Zach indignantly calls from the hallway. Karen sighs and, with one last little wave to her sister, follows her kids out the door.

When they finally leave, Claire takes a deep breath, and Owen sees her lip trembling. He comes up beside her and asks if she's alright. She quietly admits that she's really going to miss them; he tells her that he will, too.

"But hey, when we get settled…somewhere…wherever…we'll have them over," Owen suggests. "They'll be thrilled to spend a week with Badass Aunt Claire and Cool Uncle Owen."

That simple statement holds so many promises for their future – they're going to settle somewhere _together_ ; he thinks of himself as Zach and Gray's _uncle_ …and they haven't even had their second date yet – promises that excite her and make her feel calm and completely scare the hell out of her all at the same time, and she doesn't know what to say.

* * *

Their second date starts about as well as their first.

They vow to not make any of the same mistakes the second time around, but then she comes home from work with a reservation print-out in her hands because it's the _city_ , and if you don't get a reservation, you're not getting a table unless you want to sit in the lobby for two goddamn hours, and _quit teasing her_ because it already took her ten minutes more to get back to the hotel than she had planned for, and they need to _go_ , and he threatens to go exchange his slacks for board shorts.

It doesn't matter anyway, because if the bickering hadn't made them a little late, the cameras would have. There are cameras outside of the hotel when she goes to the Masrani offices in the morning, but the company has been sending a car for her, so once she makes it into the vehicle, it's not too much of a problem. Tonight, they're on their own with the rental car, and driving through the crowd of paparazzi surrounding their vehicle is a challenge, at best, scary, at worst, and the businesswoman in her notes that their presence, their relentless covering of this story, reinforces Owen's idea that maybe dinosaurs _are_ still _wow enough_.

They think they'll be fine once they make it into the restaurant, miraculously only three minutes late for their reservation, but despite being seated in the middle of the dining hall, the photographers have pressed themselves against the front windows. They try to power through – _ignore them, don't give them this power, ignore them, ignore them_ – but they're uncomfortable, and other guests are complaining, so they get their meals to go and head back to their quiet, safe, now much-too-big and much-too-empty hotel room.

He tries to set the mood, finding little candles in a bathroom drawer, lighting them with leftover matches swiped from Gray's survival pack before he left, but it's not quite the same. He opens the minibar, but then stops.

"Masrani's paying for this, right?" he asks. She nods, and he pulls out two little vials of tequila.

"What happened to nothing like how we did this last time?" she groans.

"Pretty sure that went out the window when you showed up with an itinerary," he replies.

"A reservation is _not_ an itinerary!" she insists.

"Drink up, Dearing," he says, putting the bottle down in front of her plate.

Claire makes a noise and drops her head, and Owen's not sure if she's laughing or crying. She tilts her head back up and brushes the red hair out of her face, and _thank god, she's laughing_. He asks her what she's suddenly finding so hilarious, and she's laughing so hard, he thinks he can see a tear forming in the corner of her eye as she tries to compose herself enough to reply.

"This is absurd," she says. "Everything with us is wonderful for a whole week, but the moment we try another official date…"

"Maybe we should just stop dating," he shrugs, and she knows he doesn't mean stop the relationship.

"We're clearly not very good at it," she laughs. She goes on to point out it's kind of ridiculous anyway, a second date when they're basically living together with, according to what he said after her family left, no plans to change that when things, _life_ , settles.

"I'm not going anywhere, Claire," he says, looking right at her, and her stomach flips. She tells him that's a little absurd, too. She doesn't want him to go anywhere, either, but she barely knows anything about him. He looks up from his plate and boldly says, "What do you want to know?"

They end up on the balcony with blankets and a bottle of wine, still dressed for their night out. There are cameras on the ground, watching them there, too, but they won't know that until they see the pictures online the next morning. For now, she's in one chair, curled under a blanket, bare feet tucked up underneath her, and he's in another, and they're separated by a little table where two wine glasses lay forgotten as they simply pass the bottle back and forth as they talk. She spends a lot of time looking up at the stars, something she never really took the chance to admire, despite being on a rather isolated island, and he spends a lot of time looking at her and the way the moonlight bounces off her face, something he never really got the chance to admire without admitting he still wanted her.

He likes this Claire – the casual, relaxed, drink-right-out-of-the-wine-bottle Claire. He tells her as much as he passes the bottle to her, expressing surprise that such a state of being is even possible for her, and she scoffs as she takes a drink of the wine.

"I'm _organized_ ; I'm not uptight," she says, and he maybe yanks their second date past the point of no return, because the words leave her lips, and he _laughs_ harder than he has in a while.

"That's the funniest thing you've ever said," he replies with a scoff of his own.

She rolls her eyes and chooses to ignore him, almost outwardly pouting as she keeps the wine bottle nestled in her hands, and Owen falls a little bit harder. If the version of her on the balcony tonight had shown up to their first date, and okay, fine, maybe he _shouldn't_ have worn the board shorts, they would never have had a problem. He can't believe it took a fucking dinosaur disaster for her to let him see this version of her, but, he thinks, as she loosens back up and laughs at a story he's telling about a four-day-old Echo nearly biting a finger from his left hand off while he was using his right to scold Blue for doing the exact same thing, if she had, then he would've _really_ known what he was missing if things still ended badly, so maybe it was for the best. Maybe that first date just wasn't their time.

"I'm sorry," she says, finally passing the bottle back to him as the story ends. "About your raptors."

He silently takes the bottle and nods in gratitude, for her condolences and for the drink, and stares down at it, his heart sinking, for a long time before taking a sip.

"Yeah, well," he says with another nod. "With what InGen had planned for them, I was bound to get hurt eventually. At least Blue's still out there."

He says it with such hope that it brings a sad smile to her face, and she asks if Blue was his favorite. He looks a little insulted before insisting, as any good father would, that he does not _have_ favorites; he loves all his raptors equally.

"But Blue was the beta, right?" she asks, trying again. "She was your girl?"

" _You're_ my girl," he says instantly. "But yeah, Blue was the beta of the pack."

He's not sure how she'll take such a bold declaration, and she freezes for a moment, not having expected that response to escape his lips, before a grin overtakes her face and she has to shyly look away from him again. He leans over to offer her the wine bottle, shaking it to pull her attention, and she happily steals a quick kiss as she leans over to grab it.

Their second date is infinitely better than their first.

* * *

She asks him to go to Masrani Global with her, and even though he wants to, he can't say no. They're throwing her on television again, and it's due to be held outside _again_ , and she's pretty sure what happened last time will happen again, and she wants him nearby. He makes a quip about how he's glad to see their decision making skills have improved since the incident and then follows her downstairs to meet the company car.

The press conference is about to begin, and she's in a corner checking herself out in a reflective surface, straightening her jacket, smoothing her skirt, making sure her bangs are even across her forehead and no hairs are frizzing out of her sleek, flat-ironed bob, and Owen gently puts his hand on her back. His instinct is to tell her she'll be okay, but after what happened before the last press conference, he decides a kiss to convey what he wants to say is the safer choice.

"Lipstick!" she says abruptly as he leans in, tilting away from him. He instantly leans back upright, his hands up in a mock surrender.

"Okay, so I want to do something encouraging, but I don't want you to bite my head off again, and if I can't kiss you…" he mutters. "You seem more nervous than last time."

"They didn't know about the investigation last time," she says, referring to the latest news that had leaked the day before. The corporation had yet to identify where all these leaks were coming from, but Claire's more concerned with the fact that instead of discussing the park and the Indominus and _the incident_ on the news, the pundits were now filling their time discussing _her_. "And you're helping just by being here, honey."

It's the first time she's ever called him anything resembling a pet name, and he likes the way it sounds rolling out of her perfectly painted lips, so he pulls her close to his side with one hand and leans in to her ear, whispering, "You're not helping that wanting-to-kiss-you problem I'm having."

She barely has time to breathe out a pledge of _later_ before someone's pulling her outside. Owen slips out, too, standing off to the side of the crowd instead of watching from a television inside. He's promised her he will refrain from punching anyone in the crowd who says something bad about her – _it's inevitable_ , she says – but he doesn't want to watch from inside the building; he wants her to be able to look at him if she needs something to stabilize her. She sits on a chair to the side of the podium nearest him as flashbulbs go off all around them and the acting president steps up to the microphones. She doesn't know what the new man in charge is about to say, but she thinks it might be about her since the official apology for their poor judgment in the creation of the Indominus went out shortly after its genetic makeup hit the public, and there hasn't yet been a decision regarding what to do with the park. She watches carefully as he says he knows the crowd, reporters and spectators alike, are probably all aware of the internal investigation being conducted against her, and he would like to address that before turning the press conference over to her.

"That investigation," he continues, "I am pleased to announce, has culminated in the conclusion that Ms. Dearing was acting in accordance with procedures laid out by Steven Masrani and the Masrani Global Corporation. She will retain her position with Masrani Global and Jurassic World, whatever its future may be and no disciplinary action will be taken at this time. In addition, the corporation would like to formally thank Ms. Dearing for her actions in stopping the Indominus Rex."

She tries, she tries _so hard_ not to visibly react to the news that at least that part of the hellish nightmare that her career has become is over because she knows at least half the cameras have shifted to her, and she knows whatever reaction she gives them will be the breaking story on the six o'clock news, and she doesn't even know if she _wants_ to be a part of whatever future they concoct for Jurassic World, but she's so relieved. She's _so damn relieved_ that she can't help it and lets out a breath she didn't fully realize she was holding. Despite the noise, both positive and negative, the announcement generates from the audience, she thinks she can hear Owen yelling in support, and she stifles a laugh as the conference is turned over to her.

The first reporter to ask a question starts by congratulating her, then asks about the families. Claire tells her they're meeting with the insurance company tomorrow to discuss the specifics, at which time she'll have a better answer, but, she says, "I can assure you myself and the Masrani Corporation will ensure every family affected by the events at Jurassic World will receive the proper compensation and consideration."

Owen watches from the side, filling with pride as he watches her. He knows, no matter how the questions go, she'll probably cry when it's over, lock herself in an office for a few hours, or want to spend the whole night lost in him, but for now, she's calm and cool and confident and _Claire_. He thinks, as he watches her, that despite the fact that he's out of a job and they're far away from Isla Nublar, things seem like they're finally going back to normal.

She catches his eye in the crowd; he scrunches his face into a deep grin and sends her a thumbs up, and she shoots him a small, barely discernible smile and a quick wink.

Okay. Maybe things are a little better than normal.

* * *

 _Thanks, everyone, for reading! If anyone's interested, you can find me on Tumblr under the same name I have here. And, of course, reviews make me happy :-)_


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